The Volvo Trucks NZ technical team has been busy preparing to support electric trucks on the ground in New Zealand over the past 12 months.

In December last year, Volvo Trucks NZ announced a partnership with Fonterra Brands NZ to trial the first electric Volvo truck in the country. At the launch, the clear message from Volvo Group Australia e-mobility specialist, vice president Paul Illmer, was that the actual truck is only part of the solution when it comes to New Zealand’s transition to sustainable transport.

National technicalervices manager, Fergus Lusty and his team have been doing the mahi to build the New Zealand expertise that Paul Illmer labelled ‘essential to deliver operational peace of mind’.

Intensive training at Volvo Global headquarters in Gothenburg, Sweden allows the team to certify technicians on the EV decommission/commission process and train the Sime Darby Commercial Aftersales network on processes required to prepare Truckstops’ workshops to service electric trucks and become authorised EV repairers.

“Training has been specific to the medium duty range and outlined the process of putting the 600V traction voltage system into a safe state to be able to be worked on, if component replacement or diagnosis was required in the traction voltage system,” said Fergus Lusty.

“This training also covered how to build a suitable training rig so that testing can be carried out in a safe environment during training courses. This allows faults to be simulated to test technicians’ ability to carry out this specific process before they are EV certified.”

Fergus is currently the only certified trainer able to grant Volvo certification to technicians in the New Zealand market. He has already completed similar training for the Volvo heavy duty range, set to enter the New Zealand market in late 2023/early 2024, with the order book open from mid-2023.

Plans are currently being put in place to hold future training in New Zealand as more EV Volvo trucks enter into the national fleet.